Same sex couples

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ratio1 said:
Hypothetically, if two person of the same sex who have same sex attraction and live together but they do not perform any sexual acts, nor indulge in any sexual thoughts of each other, ie pure love [looking after each other etc]
  1. are they still chaste?
  2. have they violated any Catholic teaching?
If the answer to the above is no, what it they:
  1. hold hands
  2. kiss
  3. etc etc [i hope you know what i mean, where do you start drawing the line?]
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The hypothetical is just like:
Can I as a married man think about my neighbor’s wife, who I happen to find sexually attractive?
Can I take a look when when she is pulling the weeds out front the house?
How long can I stare?
Can I ask her to help me with my landscape project?
Can I spend time at the bar with her, just talking about our children and world affairs? (this woman who I am sexually attracted to…)

You can split hypothetical legal hairs all you want, but what you are talking about here is stupidity, not morality.
The person who puts himself in situations that lead to no good is stupid.
Christians are called to be prudent, not recklessly stupid.
 
Some feelings of course are wrong.

Feelings aren’t an indication of truth or even goodness or badness and certainly not holiness or even God’s will.

SSA feelings aren’t good if they lead someone to express them in ways that go against the natural order.

Feelings are in general very bad indicator of the good and the trail.
 
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goout said:
You can split hypothetical legal hairs all you want, but what you are talking about here is stupidity, not morality.
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On your view, can a gay person ever live with another person, or must they live alone?
 
I think we’re getting confused here between the feelings themselves being “good” and the culpability if any of the person experiencing them. Same-sex attraction is disordered and not “good”, but there is no sin on the part of the person who, through no fault of their own, experiences same-sex attraction. People can’t help an involuntary reaction like attraction.
 
Assuming living together isn’t an occasion of sin for them, I don’t see any problem with it. Of course, they shouldn’t kiss or anything like that since that would be sinful and would likely lead them into further sin.
 
Well, it depends.

As heteros know…one can “fan” desires with one’s imagination…the imagination is not all on its own…a virtuous person learns how to temper one’s imagination, putting it to the good.

This isn’t taught in today’s world…but common sense would conclude this.

One only has to look at the burgeoning world of different types of porn to see how desires are fanned and reinforced (through sexual stimulation) into ever more weird areas.

So feelings don’t entirely mean “not culpable”…the Church needs to be more courageous in pointing out one’s culpability for various feelings and attractions.

Feelings need to be (and can be) brought under control of the will and the intellect (and the conscience).
 
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Those are two different things. Choosing to seek out pornography (whether gay or straight) is a conscious decision…although of course, there can be situations in which the person’s will is undermined to some degree by psychological factors, addiction, etc. But that’s a whole other ball of wax from the person who simply experiences same sex attraction. They have no more control of that than I do of the fact that I am attracted to nice looking women. It’s an unconscious response.
 
Nope.

Attractions and desires and appetites are all part of a faculty that God gave us to order to the good.

I don’t buy the “no more control”

big things start with little things.
 
Edward_H said:
Nope.

Attractions and desires and appetites are all part of a faculty that God gave us to order to the good.
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what does that mean? Are you saying that people can choose what they are attracted to?
 
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People can temper their desires, there can be no question of that.

And based on skinnerian principles…attractions that get reinforced, get stronger.

When they started - how they got reinforced - how the imagination contributed to strengthened desires - complicated result.

But there is no doubt that our desires and appetites can be jinked around a fair bit.
 
Edward_H said:
I don’t buy the “no more control”
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Oh, well then, if you don’t buy it…
Edward_H said:
But there is no doubt that our desires and appetites can be jinked around a fair bit.
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Well, of course. I’m not saying that it’s not possible to consciously reinforce a desire. Just that some desires are innate, and as far as we can tell, sexual orientation has at least some innate/biological component. No one is saying that one’s own actions or the environment can’t have an impact as well.

All this to say if you tell someone who experiences SSA but is not acting on it out of a desire not to sin that they are, in fact, sinning simply by experiencing the desire, then a big :roll_eyes: to that.
 
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and so would you say someone’s feelings could be sinful if they were reinforced by say, pornography?

Another question: Would you say that people with SSA should change their sexual attraction?
 
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I don’t think there’s that much evidence about desires/attractions as “innate”.

To simply say, as some here do, that “we’re wired” is not a rational statement.
 
I don’t know what they should or could do given how reinforced some behaviors may have become.

I do know that it’s a lie to suggest that earlier certain behaviors are channeled, strengthened, sharpened, deepened, steered…with the will being co-opted by the appetites.
 
thistle said:
Yes it is wrong. While not a sin of grave matter the Church that teaches same sex attraction is disordered.
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The word “wrong” is ambiguous here. Attractions per se are not sinful at any level. That the attraction is disordered is an objective observation. The particular ordering here (SSA) is not a good thing, because that to which the attraction is ordered is intrinsically evil.

We can say that it is not a good thing to experience SSA. But to say “it is wrong to experience SSA” ( or “SSA is wrong”) might (reasonably) be understood by some to impart moral blame - which is not at all a catholic view.
 
“Thou shalt not like the color pink, nor shalt thou find interesting Judy Garland movies. Thus saith the Lord.” - Paul’s Letter to the Lambdites

The Scriptures are very clear on this matter. 😮
 
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